red-handed from
a cruel murder, besought her patronage which, perhaps from a
fellow-feeling, she promised with great alacrity. At Grasse she won all
hearts and made many more promises, and finally, arriving at Avignon,
she found Clement covetous of the city and well-disposed to her. Yet
morality obliged him to ask an explanation of her recent change of
husbands, and before three Cardinals, whom he appointed to be her
judges, the Queen pleaded her own cause. Not a blush tinged her cheek,
no tremor altered her melodious voice as she stood before the red-robed
Princes of the Church and narrated, in fluent Latin, the story of the
assassination of Andrew, the death of her child, and her marriage with
the murderer, Louis of Tarento, who stood by her side. The wily Pope
noted behind her the proud Provencal nobles, the Villeneuves and
d'Agoults, the de Baux and the Lescaris, who brought the fealty of the
hill-country, and who did not know that, having already sold her jewels
to the Jews, their fair Queen was covenanting with the Pope for Avignon.
The formal trial ended, the Pontiff solemnly declared the Queen to be
guiltless,--and she granted him the city for eighty thousand pieces of
gold."

[Illustration: "THE GREAT PALACE."--AVIGNON.]

Clement enjoyed ownership in the same agreeable manner as his
predecessors, "without the untying of purse-strings." Perhaps he used
the purse's contents for the more pressing claim of the great Palace of
which he built so large a part; perhaps he handed it, still filled, to
Innocent VI who built the famous fortifications of Avignon and protected
himself against the marauding "White Companies," perhaps it was still
untouched when Bertrand du Guesclin and his Grand Company stood before
the gate and demanded "benediction, absolution, and two hundred thousand
pounds." "What!" the Pope is said to have cried, "must we give
absolution, which here in Avignon is paid for, and then give money
too--it is contrary to reason!" Du Guesclin replied to the bearer of
these words, "Here are many who care little for absolution, and much for
money,"--and Urban yielded.

Gregory XI, the last of the "French Popes," returned to Rome, and at his
death the "Great Schism" followed;--Clement VII, in Avignon, was
recognised by France, Spain, Scotland, Sicily, and Cyprus; Urban VI, in
Rome, by Italy, Austria, and England. The County Venaissin was ravaged
by wars and the pests that come in their train. At length the
A